Friday, March 18, 2016

The State portfolio has shrunk by 24 billion euros on the stock market – Le Figaro

THE SCAN ECO / GRAPHICS – While Michel Sapin announced any state holdings disposals to recapitalize EDF, the state portfolio decreased by 30% since April 2015.

The state shareholder is a poor manager. In a little over 83 billion euros in April 2015, its portfolio of listed investments is no longer “only” 59 ​​billion, according to figures released by the Agency for State Holdings. A drop of nearly 30%! At the same time, the CAC 40 fell by about 12%. Among the largest “palms” include EDF (-57%), Areva (54%) or Engie (-26%). The State certainly pays its excessive exposure to the energy sector values ​​including EDF which it owns nearly 85% stake.

If we are to believe the recent statements of Emmanuel Macron, the state is not about to reduce its stake in EDF. This morning Michel Sapin confirmed the possibility of increasing the share of the state in the group’s capital. And that would be detrimental to other interests.

We know in particular that the state plans to sell some 5% of Renault’s capital (1.2 billion euros) it had acquired in April 2015 to impose voting rights doubles in the business. Since the announcement, the action was down ten cents … Ditto for his rival Peugeot (-0.55%).

Among the few good news (4 of 13 listed holdings) three are significant in a year: Thales (+ 38.54%) and Air France KLM (+ 18.81%) in spite of the social and financial crisis that this flagship of French industry whose accounts are out of the red there just a month. This allowed the action to regain some colors (+ 21.7%), from just under 7 to almost 8.5 euros. Note the nice outfit (+ 8.49%) Orange which the state had sold in late 2014, nearly 2% of its stake. At the time, investors feared further disposals of securities Orange. Today, as the phone company is negotiating to buy Bouygues Telecom, the state, Orange shareholder, seems to want to stay. And for a long time.